Hitman: Absolution (PC)

“A lot of modern games are fast paced ation/ first person shooters, however Hitman Absolution sticks the biggest middle finger up to the modern developers and goes for a slower, more cautious approach. But does it pay off? Story- Right off the...”

“A lot of modern games are fast paced ation/ first person shooters, however Hitman Absolution sticks the biggest middle finger up to the modern developers and goes for a slower, more cautious approach. But does it pay off?

Story- Right off the bat you will notice a large difference in the Hitman playbook as Agent 47 actually gets a story line to follow! In preivous Hitman games you were using Agent 47 to assassinate given targets and wll... That's about as engaging as it got, however this time round Agent 47 is instructed to kill his old friend and colleuge Diana Burnwood- a character who die hard fans will mourn as ridiculously as I did. Suffice it to say Agent 47 shoots Diana who, in turn, tasks Agent 47 with the most difficult baby-sitting job of all time: Looking after a girl named Victoria who has a strong resemblence to some bratty teenager who seems to want 47 to get shot at more times than Colonel Gadafi on a busy Sunday. But it's a nice change from the usual briefing, executing and escaping formula that previous installments in the franchise seemed to love so much, and the plot definately does have some shocking momments so therefore I can't find to much area to complain.

Gameplay- A massive face lift was given to Absolution. Some that are nicely implemented: Cover system, better inventory system and more user-friendly interface. However most of the gameplay changes had me litteraly cringing im my chair: Checkpoints, no pre-level weapon selection, instinct abilities and the worst sin of all; much more linear levels! Hitman should NOT be another linear clone of games like Splinter Cell, it has been and always should be an open level experience that lets the player advance through the game in their own way. But instead hitman feels more like a game where the player starts on one side of a room filled with police, having to wait for a millenium just for the police to finish their scripted diolouge before getting through the room only to recive the biggest score reduction for not going the way the game wants you to! Even in rare sections where the game gives you free choice- you have to complete the objective in the way the developers intended or your score will plummet like a stone off a cliff.

Graphics- Urg! Hitman Absolution! In a leap to make the game 'Pretty' and 'modern' something good got left behind; Good meaty gameplay! But now we have good looking graphics... And nothing to show for it. Honestly I was hoping that Square Enix would grasp the idea that we don't want a linear, modern and typical game, we want retro! We want focused gameplay where good features are kept and bad ones discarded! Not a complete make-over with new controls and feature that just alienate the true fans! But most of all we want the old, classic and flawless Hitman back!

4/10

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